Software applications interact with each other in a data processing environment for processing business transactions. A business transaction is a request for performing an operation, with or without a corresponding response. Typically, such a request is for an operation relative to data maintained for a business purpose.
For example, a purchase order entry application may send a request for getting a purchase order approved to another application that may implement a purchase order approval process. As another example, a scheduler application may send a request to begin processing the purchase orders for the day to another application that may implement a batch process for submitting and processing purchase orders.
An application for processing a business transaction usually depends on a collection (cloud) of Business Objects (BO). A business object is a combination of code and data that provides certain functionality that is useful in processing a business transaction. Several business objects can interact with each other, such as in a cloud, to provide more complex business functions. A cloud of business objects may be configured to offer particular functions or services intended to be offered by the application.